Here I’ll be compiling all of the research and planning I’ll be doing towards my group’s video lecture. Our theme is horror and the psychological effects of horror. This is a very challenging theme, I’ll be thinking of ways to compile as much as possible into my groups’ 1-minute lecture. I will definitely be aiding in the written voice-over parts and the editing if possible. My group will each do at least one piece of research so we end up with a good amount of research altogether from different perspectives.
Morbid Curiosity
Morbid curiosity is the psychological phenomena where we as humans have that draws us towards the macabre and general gruesome and scary things. Prof. Glenn Sparks from Purdue University did a study on why we like scary films and what he concluded to was that we don’t necessarily enjoy being scared it is more to do with satisfaction and the gratification from enduring such horrid imagery. Stephen King the world-renowned horror author explained that viewing scary things helps us deal with our own real-life horrors. “We make up horrors, to help us cope with the real ones” – Stephen King. Viewing scenes of violence, anger, and rage can aid us in burning off the anger and rage we feel; it gives us a sense of catharsis.
What I find fascinating is when psychologist James Geer created the Fear survey schedule II is what most people who took part in this survey found scary. A lot of people found war and terror attacks as scary which is understandable however a lot of people also feared instances like public speaking, looking foolish and making mistakes which aren’t imminent threats compared to war or getting bitten by a potentially venomous snake. Our ancestors learned to be scared of the right things to stay alive so why are we now scared of non-imminent threats? I think we enjoy Scary films and imagery as we ourselves choose what we want to be scared of, we don’t have much of a decision when it comes to war or other real-life terrors. However, when we sit down in the movie theatre or in our homes we can choose what we want to give us the creeps. Which ends up making us all feel a little stronger and two inches taller.
The script should be no more than 200 words long to fit into the 1-minute margin. This can work in our favour as we don’t need to place much filler and go straight to the point and be as concise as possible. We should use a what, why, how model. What is Morbid Curiosity, Why are we attracted to horror and horrid imagery and How that affects the human psyche. The most challenging aspect of this project I think is how we’re going to emulate this visually. From watching other video lectures I’ve deciphered that there are two ways that are traditionally used in video lectures. Either an animation of sorts or different clips from different sources to help illustrate the point, I think my group may use the latter.
Scream 1996: A new age of Slasher
Wes Craven’s modern-day cult classic Scream is a quintessential example of a slasher film with an extra kick. I think what really gives this film its punch is how it identifies it has the tropes of a typical slasher film and becomes somewhat self-aware. What is most compelling about this film due to all the characters being aware of all the classics e.g. Halloween, Nightmare on elm street etc. this leads into how the killers (Billy & Stu) were inspired to go on their killing spree. What this tells us is that it’s very possible for deranged individuals to be inspired to commit copycat killings.
The Exorcist 1973
The Exorcist is a classic when it comes to paranormal horror films, it was one of the first horror films that really shaped the horror genre. When this film was released it was a different time in the film industry, horror was not as sophisticated as it is now; due to our use of SFX we virtually have no limitations. Back then it was very basic however this was all new to the audience and felt very real. I found an article that entails the tragic story of a woman Gina Frost who watched The Exorcist and ended up getting severe Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Frost states that the hallucinations started just after she left the movie theatre. When recalling the night she watched it she said: “I remember people running out of the cinema to be sick and there were girls screaming behind me,”. After watching the film she spent 9 weeks locked inside her room, she’d have hallucinations of rats scurrying up her walls, of her being murdered in gruesome ways and other horrifying hallucinations. What this tells us is that horror films do have the ability to literally traumatise you for the rest of your life. This doesn’t mean we should stop watching horror films altogether or have them banned in an entire nation like what the British government did in the 1980’s with films they deemed “Video Nasties”. It really is just a warning that if you know you could not handle a scary film don’t watch it. The Exorcist is not even close to how scary some of the new and recent films of the past decade are but we can have no doubt that it surely was nightmare fuel to people who watched it at the time.
http://www.imdb.com/list/ls051364249/
This is the background music we’ll be using.
Tehreem Hussain 